


Nightmare Comforting

by axolotlparty



Category: Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
Genre: Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Nightmare
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-09
Updated: 2013-08-09
Packaged: 2017-12-22 22:55:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,267
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/918976
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/axolotlparty/pseuds/axolotlparty
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Julian always has fitful sleep when he loses a patient. But right after his genetic status was revealed, he grew paranoid to the point where he thought he was someone else. Now, how comforting can his Cardassian lover really be to him?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Nightmare Comforting

_“All right, Lieutenant T’Vey,” Doctor Bashir said “Your ankle should be able to support you now, but I’m putting you on light duties until-“_

_The door of the infirmary opened without even chiming. Julian turned around to gripe to who was surely either Odo or Garak but he was promptly forced into holo-cuffs._

_The infirmary was suddenly swarming with Starfleet security personnel with phasers pointed at him. These were nothing like the justice-driven Bajorans he’d been so used to on the station. No, they were bloodthirsty animals in a fancy uniform. And their captain was no better._

_“Doctor Julian Subatoi Bashir, I have been ordered to arrest you on the count of intentional manslaughter”_

_“Intentional manslaughter! What the hell are you talking about?” He shouted._

_“Yesterday at Nineteen hundred hours, a heavily damaged Cardassian vessel was sent here. All of its occupants were on the brink of death and all but one lived.” The captain read from his PADD._

_Julian remembered with a pang. There was an explosion aboard an experimental Cardassian science vessel. All nineteen had lived except the woman at the epicenter of the blast. Her right leg and arm had been blown off in the blast. She was losing blood more quickly than it could be replenished. Her cognitive functions were shutting down. Her body had accepted that this was the end and there was nothing that even the great, genetically-enhanced “superdoctor” could do about it._

_She was dead within a minute of her arrival on Deep Space Nine._

_Her companions thanked the doctor for doing what he could and those who were capable of travel took her body to Cardassia for the proper burial that morning._

_And now Julian was paying the price for it._

_“Julian, why’d you do it? Didn’t you take the Hippocratic Oath?” Jadzia said, coming up from behind him._

_“Shoulda known he’d snap eventually” Miles jibed. “He’s no better than the rest of his kind. He’s just better at hiding it.”_

_“Ladies and Gentlemen, the next great Khan Noonien Singh!” Quark chuckled_

_“No, he’s no Khan.” Captain Sisko said “He’s just a Jem’hadar. Unfeeling, un-natural, and he has no place in the Federation. Take him away”._

_“N-No! There was nothing I could do! She was beyond help!”_

_Julian looked up. Before him stood the most frightened looking Jem’hadar he had ever seen. He was holo-cuffed and…were those tears in his eyes? The Jem’hadar can’t cry._

_Unless they happen to be the reflection of Doctor Julian Bashir._

_AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!_

Garak was thrashed out of his sleep. His lover was screaming over him, throwing himself around in a violent sleeping fit. He grabbed Julian’s shoulders and shook.

“Wake up! _Wake up Julian!_ ” the Cardassian shouted.

The young human continued to thrash violently.

Elim gripped Julian by the hair on the crown of his head and jerked. Julian’s eyes shot open and he gasped for air.

“Julian, what happened?!” Elim pleaded. His lover was still gulping for air between sobs that he could not stop. He couldn’t support himself. Elim reached behind Julian and hugged him. Julian’s naked body was drenched in cold sweat and cooling urine.

“Get off of me. Garak”

“Excuse me?”

Julian’s bloodshot brown eyes met Elim’s cool blue ones and narrowed.

“I said get OFF you great fool!” He screeched

Julian threw himself from his lover. “You don’t WANT me! I’m just a fucking Jem’hadar!”

Elim was taken aback at this statement. How could his boyfriend (as silly as that human term was, it applied to Julian) believe such nonsense?

“Julian, you’ve just awoken from the grips of a _fu’nok_. You cannot believe these things about yourself, it’s impossible.” Elim tried to rationalize with the panicked doctor.

“Then WHY did I let that woman DIE!!” Julian screamed “I don’t care about anyone but myself! I’m horrible! I’m disgusting!”

“If you would please calm down for a moment, I could explain to you every way in which you are not a Jem’Hadar.”

Elim reached to the bed for one of the relatively undamaged blankets and wrapped Julian inside of it. Normally, the blanket would be thrown off immediately in the humid heat of their shared quarters but the blanket was welcome in the doctor's panicked state.

The tailor carried the human to their couch and replicated a cup of hot Red leaf tea for him.

“Now, tell me what happened.”

Julian wiggled his arms out of the blanket to take the tea; hit arms could hardly keep the mug steady. “It’s really nothing of interest. Just something over what happened yesterday with the death of Professor Aradine Gelim. You know I don’t sleep well right after I’ve lost a patient.”

“But you’ve never been violent or claimed that you are a Jem’hadar.”

“Well, that’s because no one knew about my genetic status! Now it’s all that people can associate with me. People are talking, Elim. And it’s not the kind of gossip there was when we moved in together. This is people fearing for their lives. They’re all afraid I’m going to snap and take over the station or something.”

“Now I know that’s nonsense. The only person I’ve heard talk about it is Morn, and he talks about everything.” Elim rolled his eyes.

“Yeah, well you don’t have the best sense of hearing, do you?” Julian snorted

“Ah, shit. I’m sorry, Elim. I mean, of course they’re not going to say anything around you. They’re dead scared you’ll do something horrible to them if I get insulted around you.”

“My dear doctor.” Elim held Julian’s willowy arms “I believe you are getting paranoid”

“Like a Jem’hadar without enough Ketracel” Julian muttered.

“Now I hear _that._ ” Garak said. “Allow me to explain to you why you are not one of those awful slaves to the founders.”

Elim left the couch and came back not a minute later with a very raggedy stuffed toy.

“My darling, explain to me the significance of this, eh, Kualakal.”

“How many times do I have to tell you it’s Kukalaka. Ku-ka-la-ka.” Julian sounded it out like he was explaining how to operate a hypospray to a tribble.

“Exactly. And to Jem’hadar keep comfort objects such as Kukalakas?”

“…no” Julian threatened to crack a smile.

“Precisely. Jem’hadar refuse all comforts, such as drinks and blankets and soft toys. Therefore you are not a Jem’hadar. And if you’re still not convinced-“

Garak made off off for their bedroom again, this time returning with a small, wooden, lacquered box.

“Do you remember what this box contains?” Elim asked.

Julian’s smile cracked.

“That would be every story we’ve given each other to read, every transmission we’ve shared from Deep Space Nine to the Defiant, and all the poetry you’ve written me”

“Not entirely. You see, this box contains _love._ And above all else, a Jem’hadar absolutely cannot love. So, I’m going to ask you again. Julian Subatoi Bashir, are you a Jem’hadar?”

Julian’s smile turned into a beacon of joy.

“I most certainly am not.” He boasted.

“Good, because I don’t think a Jem’hadar would appreciate the rest of a good night’s sleep” Elim said as he got up.

“Sounds good to-ah, damn! I soiled the bed, didn’t I?” Julian’s eyes threatened tears again.

Elim quickly pacified the doctor in a tight hug.

“My dear doctor, I daresay those sheets have seen worse from us. A quick spin through the sonic laundry machine and they’ll be good as new.”

Julian dropped the now too-hot blanket and kissed the tailor on the mouth. They’d be spending the rest of their evening on the couch.

Or possibly against a wall…

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this whole shit in one sitting. god i can hardly see right now. another chapter to one cardassian, slightly used is coming at you soon :)


End file.
